Holocaust survivors to speak at Seton Hill Kristallnacht Remembrance service

Three Pittsburgh area Holocaust survivors will speak at the annual Kristallnacht Remembrance Interfaith Service at the National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education and the Office of Campus Ministry at Seton Hill University on Tuesday.

The service marks 81 years since Kristallnacht, the infamous “night of broken glass” November 9-10, 1938, when Nazis burned synagogues, looted Jewish homes and businesses and murdered Jews throughout Germany, Austria and other Nazi controlled areas.

The violent state-inspired program that culminated in the deaths of 91 Jews, the looting of 7,000 Jewish businesses, the arrest of 30,000 Jewish males and the desecration or destruction of 267 synagogues is remembered for the broken glass that littered the ground from the shattered windows of Jewish-owned businesses.

Tuesday’s service will feature speakers including Ruth Drescher, who survived Kristallnacht as a child growing up in Germany, Shulamit Bastacky, who survived the Holocaust as a “Hidden Child” and Rabbi Walter Jacob, Rabbi Emeritus at Rodef Shalom in Pittsburgh, who escaped Nazi Germany with his family after Kristallnacht.

The 6 p.m. service, which is open to the public, will be held in Seton Hill University’s Saint Joseph Chapel in the Administration Building on the hilltop campus in Greensburg.

Seton Hill launched its National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education in November 1987 by commemorating Kristallnacht. Students, faculty and community members gather with Holocaust survivors at the university every November to remember Kristallnacht with word, music and reflection.